The Spark Before The Explosion
by ILikeUdon
Summary: On a mission, Naruto met Deidara's younger sister who was later enlisted under Konoha's shinobi force and the two eventually became close friends. The thing is, she's a spy sent by Akatsuki and Sasuke to aid in Konoha's destruction.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

**Hey, this is a new fic! Reviews are highly appreciated.  
I'm not sure if there'll be any pairings in this story as of yet, we'll just have to see as it progresses. However, I'm open to suggestions.  
I do not own Naruto, but Taiga is my original character.  
Enjoy!****

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"SINCE WHEN DID DEIDARA HAVE BOOBS?!" Uzumaki Naruto screamed.

The blonde teenager's teammate, Hatake Kakashi and Haruno Sakura were just as shocked, if not as confused as they prepared to fight the S-Ranked ninja. The team had been sent to a nearby village in the Land Of Fire for their latest mission and had arrived to the chilling sight of an entire village massacre. Mutilated bodies were strewn everywhere and blood was splattered on every surface available. At Kakashi's command, the team had searched the village for survivors or a possible hint as to who or what may have caused such a disturbing scene. The Konoha ninjas were unable to find anything and were just about to head back to their village to report the situation when Naruto detected a movement out of the corner of his eye, causing him to immediately tackle the object.

That object just so happened to be Deidara, who immediately kicked Naruto off him.

"You retard! I'm not Deidara!"

That statement stopped the team in their tracks. The person standing before them was not wearing the Akatsuki ring or robes. Even the ninja hiate that showed Deidara to be a missing-nin of Iwagakure was absent. Instead, the mysterious person wore an altered version of a kimono that looked like a unique kunoichi suit and red ninja sandals. The kimono was black and decorated with patterns of red camillas. It had long, loose sleeves, with the skirt ending halfway up the person's thigh. The kimono was tight at the body and had a neckline that dipped slightly, thus invoking the previous statement from Naruto.

Kakashi narrowed his eyes, not letting his guard down for even a second. "What is your business here?" Although the stranger before him was essentially the female lookalike of Deidara - blonde hair, fringe covering half of her face, completely black eyes - he could tell that this person was certainly not him. In fact, she had a feminine voice, and upon closer inspection, looked to be around Naruto's and Sakura's age, if not maybe a year older at most.

"Dude, relax," the girl said, rolling her eyes. Her stance was completely relaxed, although in her opinion, it was her that needed to be suspicious. After all, the ninja standing before her ready to attack were a weird bunch. There was the man with more than half of his face covered, the boy that tackled her for no reason wearing orange and a girl with annoyingly pink hair.

"I'm not from this village," she continued. "I was travelling to Konoha actually - yes I know you three are from there - when I heard sounds coming from the direction of the village. They sounded like explosions, and there were screams of terror. I quickly made my way here to the village. And those are your culprits there, so you're welcome."

Kakashi followed her gaze and saw group of bandits tied and gagged together. They were unmistakably dead. He considered what she said. From what he had observed, her description seemed fairly accurate. The wounds found on majority of the corpses suggested the use of explosives. Furthermore, she looked like she got to the village recently as there were no traces of ash or bloodstains on her at all,telling him that she wasn't involved in the village massacre.

"How did you do away with the bandits?"

"Simple. They weren't the brightest people you'd meet. A well-thought out plan had them blasted with their own explosives."

"Why were you headed to Konoha?" Sakura inquired.

"Well," the girl said, now talking to Sakura, "That's because I wanted to go there to be enlisted as a shinobi. I've never been registered as one officially, but I've been training here and there and doing missions for different villages and people from time to time. I just felt like settling down and getting some of stability into my life for a bit and thought that Konoha seemed to be the best choice."

"Well, you sure picked the right choice! Konoha is awesome!" Naruto said enthusiastically.

Although things were starting to make more sense now, Kakashi still did not fully trust the girl. Something about her just seemed... off. However, he decided that taking her to Konoha with them to talk to the Hokage should clear up a few things and it was also where the girl was headed to at least.

"We'll take you to Konoha with us," Kakashi said finally. "I'm Hatake Kakashi, this is Haruno Sakura, and that boy over there is Uzumaki Naruto."

The girl's eyes lit up for a moment. So the retard there was the famous Kyubii containter, pinky the Hokage's apprentice, and the well-known copy ninja was the man with the Icha Icha book sticking out of his vest. "Oh! I'm sorry, I haven't introduced myself either," she said. "My name's Taiga. I don't exactly have a clan name... Or well, I prefer to choose not to remember."

"Really?" Naruto prodded. He was now right up in her face as he studied her features closely. "You sure look a lot like someone we know."

The girl scrowled before swatting Naruto away like a fly for invading her personal space. She then smirked at the trio in front of her.

"Ah yes. I'm Taiga, younger sister to Deidara."

Now Kakashi really knew that he had to let this girl talk to the Hokage.

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"Shut up, damn it!" Taiga said for what must have been at least the tenth time.

She was annoyed. Naruto had been pelting her with question after question after she revealed that she was related to Deidara, some of which were serious and others just plain stupid and insulting.

"Whose hair is longer? Yours or his?"

"Shut up."

"Were you from Iwagakure too, then?"

"Stop asking me so many questions!"

"When did you last see your brother?"

"Can't you ever keep quiet?"

"Can I see if you have weird hands too?! ... OUCH!"

"Don't touch me, retard!"

"Can you see with both eyes, or only with the one that isn't covered by your fringe?"

"..."

In Taiga's opinion, the sooner they got to Konoha, the better.

"Where'd you get your kimo-"

"Hey Naruto, save the interrogation for later," Taiga shot a grateful look at Kakashi for intervening. "You'll probably be around when she talks to the Hokage anyway, so you can find out plenty about her then."

There was a brief silence.

"Do you like ramen?"

Taiga's eye twitched, but thankfully it was covered by her fringe.

"We're almost there!" This time, Taiga was saved by Sakura. True enough, the entrance gate to Konoha was already visible.

As the group of four approacked the gate, the ninjas on duty gave a friendly wave to Naruto, Sakura and Kakashi as they passed by. However, they froze when they saw Taiga, seeing as she bore unmistakable resemblance to Deidara.

"Not to worry," Kakashi said. "We're going to take her to see the Hokage now."

The rest of the way to the Hokage tower was pretty much uneventful. They didn't run into anyone, and hardly anyone glanced at the group as they walked. They soon reached Tsunade's office.

"BAA-CHAN!" Naruto greeted happily as he barged into the office. Tsunade, in the midst of settling her endless pile of paperwork, smiled at the team, glad for a distraction. However, her smile turned into a questioning gaze as she cast her sight upon the last person who entered the room. The person who looked a whole lot like Deidara.

"Who's this, Kakashi?" Tsunade asked. "And you're back much earlier than expected from your mission."

Taiga was pleasantly surprised that it was this easy for her to get into Konoha. However, she was slightly apprehensive about the Hokage. From what she heard before she set off, Tsunade had a fiery temper and was rather sharp. She knew that she'd have to watch her manners when she was around Tsunade.

"This is Taiga," Kakashi answered. "We arrived at the assigned village only to find that it had already been totally destroyed and everyone already murdered by the bandits. However, we ran into Taiga here who showed us the bandits whom she killed with their own explosives after devising a plan. She then explained to us that she was initially heading towards Konoha to request to be enlisted into the village's ninja force. She's been training herself, hopping from town to town and doing various missions, but has never been officially registered with any village. She wishes to settle down here."

"I see," Tsunade said. Things were making sense so far. Now, she just needed to find out a bit more about the girl before she made her choice. There was no need to worry about the mission already, as the girl known as Taiga had apparently seen to that.

"Oh," Kakashi added, "She's the younger sister of Deidara. That's why we thought we'd better take her to you personally."

Tsunade paused. Deidara? That was the S-Ranked Akatsuki member. The one that had managed to actually kidnap Gaara, knock him out, and get his Bijuu extracted. Gaara, the Kazekage of Sunagakure. Now she was really curious about the girl standing before her.

"Taiga?"

"Yes, Hokage-sama?"

Naruto looked back and forth between Tsunade and Taiga. Taiga was so obnoxious when he talked to her just now, and suddenly here she turned into a polite, demure and well-behaved teenager when she spoke to the Hokage.

"I have a few questions to ask you. Please answer them honestly as they will help with my decision as to whether you should be an official shinobi of Konoha or not." Tsunade said. "It's just to find out more about you. First, tell me more about yourself. Why aren't you in Iwagakure?"

"Well, it is true that Iwagakure is my birthplace. I trained my ninja skills with my parents and older brother. However, as you know already, my brother abandoned us and the village and later on joined Akatsuki. I was only six when that happened. After that, everything took a downward turn. I knew there were some issues going on to do with my family, but since I was still so young there were many details that I did not know. But all I remember is that one day when I was eleven, my whole family was attacked and murdered. I was the only one to escape. Evidently, I had to make a run for it from my village or I would have been quickly found and killed. I was always moving around on my own ever since then and assumed dead by my village."

"And you never found out what happened?" Tsunade asked.

"Never," Taiga confirmed, her face looking haunted by the memories. "I was too young then, and even afterwards I had no one to ask."

"I'm sorry for your loss," Tsunade said. "Then how old are you now?"

"Sixteen."

Naruto jumped up. "That's the same age as me and Sakura-chan!"

Taiga shot Naruto a glare. "Shut up and don't interrupt."

"Anyway," Tsunade continued as Naruto's shoulders slumped visibly, "What kind of things have you been doing for the past five years on your own?"

"I've been travelling around and training, mostly. I work on my jutsu alone and haven't had any sensei before. I've done a number of missions for smaller villages that don't have any ninja to help protect them, but it has never been anything too serious or dangerous in my opinion. You could say that my life so far has been rather uneventful. So that's why I wanted to do something more with my life and come to Konoha... To prove myself further."

Tsunade nodded. She liked what she was hearing so far. But she had yet to ask the most important question.

"And your brother? Have you had any contact with Deidara or anyone associated with him since he abandoned your village?"

Taiga shook her head. "Unfortunately, no. I have tried to search for him before or look for clues that might lead me to him, but I've had no luck so far. I'm not going to give up looking as he is my brother after all, but I suppose if we're meant to meet up again in the future, it'll just happen."

Tsunade stared at the young girl. There was no hint of deception in her eyes, just honesty and earnestness. She really was sincere in her intentions. In fact, she practically radiated innocence. Either that, or she was one heck of a liar. But since the later had a near zero probability as Tsunade had never met anyone who could be that good at deception, she decided that Taiga was harmless enough.

"Please, Hokage-sama, enlist me as one of your village's shinobi. I will not let you down. I would hate it if I were to be rejected now after making the effort to come all the way here simply because I'm related to an S-rank criminal - something that I have no control over and shouldn't be discriminated for." Taiga's eyes shimmered with hope and even fear of being denied her dream.

That last comment really hit home with Tsunade and Naruto. Naruto had felt like that for the longest time. He had the Kyubii sealed inside of him at birth, something that he definitely couldn't have control over seeing as he was just an infant, and he was by no means the demon fox itself, but yet he was still scorned upon and shunned aside because of that. Naruto reasoned in his head that maybe Taiga wasn't so bad, and that she just had a rough childhood too. As for Tsunade, she held a soft spot for Naruto and saw him as if he was her younger brother, and felt for him and knew how the villagers treated him before he began to rise up and gain their respect. Naruto and Tsunade had started to take a liking to this girl. They could definitely identify with what she was feeling.

Tsunade looked at Taiga gave a genuine smile. "Well, Taiga, don't worry. I just need you to fill up a few forms and give you a skill test to determine your rank, and then you'll be a Konoha shinobi in no time at all."

Taiga gasped. "Thank you, Hokage-sama! T-th-this really means a lot to me!"

_This girl is too sweet_, Tsunade thought as Taiga's began to show traces of tearing up.

Taiga was overjoyed in her success. But not in the way the four other ninja thought she was. Who knew that she was one heck of a liar? She smirked inwardly, though on the outside she moved forward to engulf Tsunade in a tight, teary hug. She could practically sense Kakashi, Naruto and Sakura smiling behind her at the current scene and Tsunade was looking at her with warmness and approval in her gaze.

_Hook, line and sinker_, she thought as Tsunade's arms wrapped around her to complete the embrace. _If only they knew_.


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: **

**2nd chapter is out! Reviews would always be nice.  
I don't own Naruto or any other characters except for Taiga.**

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Taiga found herself in the middle of a huge clearing bordered by dense forest in one of Konoha's training grounds. Kakashi stood opposite her, a single bell attached to the side of his belt. She was going through the all-too-famous bell test so that Tsunade could determine her skill level and decide on her rank. She was going to work solo against Kakashi and had five hours to get the job done.

Glancing to her left where Tsunade, Naruto and Sakura stood, she waited for the signal so she could begin. Tsunade nodded and took a deep breath.

"Start!"

Taiga immediately backed up a few paces from Kakashi. From what Deidara had told her, Kakashi was one strong opponent and he had a sharingan which was now visible as he had lifted up his ninja hiate. She knew that it would be plain stupid to get too close to him, considering that her taijutsu was less than competent as she'd only ever really trained her ninjutsu. Genjutsu was not her forte either.

"Aren't you going to come at me?" Kakashi tried to provoke her into attacking.

Taiga stayed still. She didn't necessarily need to fight him, just get that tiny bell attached to the jonin by a single string. All she needed to do was to wet the string, and the bell was as good as hers. A plan forming in her head, she charged forward at Kakashi.

Back at where the other three ninja stood, Tsunade raised an eyebrow. Charging at the opponent for a direct and obvious attack wasn't the best thing to do. On the other hand, Naruto couldn't help but grin. He remembered that he'd always charge head on when he was younger, something that always earned him a few painful strikes at various places of his body before he was thrown back onto his rear. He was already visualising Taiga getting knocked back by a single lazy moment of Kakashi's arm. Sakura just wondered if the girl even knew what she was doing.

Soon enough, their doubts turned to surprise and curiosity as the ground beneath Kakashi's feet began to explode, forcing him to jump back and dodge the blows while keeping an eye on Taiga as she approached. The explosions around Kakashi never stopped, but started to increase with three explosions on average occurring at the same time in no particular pattern.

Kakashi was shocked. This was something that was unexpected. As jumping up too high would make him an easy target for Taiga, he decided that dodging the explosions on the ground would be something that he just had to deal with.

Taiga formed a simple hand seal. "Water element: Jet of Water!"

A huge stream of water began to shoot out of Taiga's mouth. It was easy enough to avoid, but just as Kakashi was about to move to the left, the ground at that spot blew up, making him jump back again to his initial spot, right in time for Taiga's water jet to drench him from head to toe. He found it weird that she would use such a basic jutsu that wouldn't harm him, but only cover him in water.

The explosions on the ground still hadn't ceased, and Kakashi was forced to keep retreating back while Taiga advanced forward. Very soon, Kakashi would be in the midst of the forest as he was being pushed back by the explosions. Kakashi eyed Taiga as she came nearer and nearer, when she suddenly stopped and picked something off the ground. His eyes grew wide as he realised it was the bell and his hand flew to his belt. Sure enough, the bell was no longer there.

"Looks like I win!" Taiga gloated, running back to where Tsunade stood and beckoning Kakashi to follow her. Right now, he was really confused. She hadn't even gotten near enough to try and grab the bell.

Tsunade, Naruto and Sakura stared at the former Iwagakure teen as she pranced around happily, jingling the bell in their faces.

"How did you get it so quickly?!" Naruto spluttered. He couldn't believe it! He was almost jealous of this girl.

"That's what I want to know, too," Tsunade said just as Kakashi reached them.

"Fine, fine," Taiga waved her hand lazily, a huge grin on her face. "I specialise in explosions and blowing things up."

"Somehow that doesn't surprise me..." Naruto muttered.

Taiga continued her explanation. "But I can't just blow anything up. I think you all might have already figured it out, but I have an affinity to the water element. I can only blow things up when they have water on them. I was able to keep blowing up the ground because of the grass. And then I drenched Kakashi so I could detach the bell from him by making the string explode. It would be hard for him to notice or even hear the bell being separated from him as he was occupied enough with all the 'bangs' of the other explosions around him."

"Oh, I see," Sakura said. "You're a lot like your brother..."

Taiga nodded and pretended to look interested as Sakura gave her a brief description of Deidara's abilities. She knew already knew all of this information, plus some more that the pink haired girl didn't seem to know.

"Hold on," Naruto said. He was still confused. "How did you blow up the grass, then?"

"Ah," Taiga said. "Have you heard of the word 'dew'?" She smirked as Naruto shot her a look for her sarcasm.

"Anyway," Tsunade said, "I haven't really gotten to see any of your other abilities, but I can tell that your ninjutsu is already jonin level. What about your taijutsu and genjutsu?"

Taiga suppressed a snort. Jonin? Her ninjutsu was easily S-rank. But she didn't need to let Tsunade know that in order to not arouse suspicion, so instead she planted a sheepish expression on her face. "Heh... I don't know any genjutsu at all, and I've never really trained in taijutsu, so I would say it's definitely below average."

Naruto hid a smile. So she wasn't that awesome after all! He was more well-rounded than her, so he could still hope to beat her.

"I see," Tsunade pondered Taiga's words for a moment. "Very well then, you shall start as a genin."

The was silence for a split second.

"WHAT THE FU-"

"WHOOOO!" Taiga's swearing was cut off by Naruto's cheer. She was a going to be a genin! A genin! Now he wasn't going to be the only one stuck in that lowly rank.

"Although your ninjutsu is very impressive, I'm afraid I can't let you be anything higher than a genin because of your other skills. Promoting you right to chunnin might harm you in the long run. Starting as a genin would help you have more time and opportunity to work on your taijutsu or genjutsu. And it's okay, Naruto here is also a genin, so you won't be alone."

If Taiga was annoyed then, she was seriously pissed now. "You're telling me that I'm at the same level as him?! I have an ego, you know!"

"So do I!" Naruto shot back. "You haven't even seen me fight yet, let alone all my awesome, fear-inspiring techniques that will help me become Hokage one day!"

Taiga just glared at the blonde ninja. Yes, she'd heard from all the Akatsuki members that Naruto's biggest dream was to become the Hokage. But she supposed that she could make being a genin work for her. "Whatever, we'll see how great you are when I squish you later."

Tsunade cleared her throat. "Taiga, I've decided to assign you to team seven as well. You will be filling up the last spot on this three-man team." She was careful to leave out Sasuke's name. Upsetting Naruto and Sakura was something she didn't want to do.

Taiga stared at Tsunade for a while. Didn't that place once belong to Sasuke? She knew that he was a sensitive topic around Naruto and Sakura. Sasuke himself told her about his whole 'ditch Konoha' thing as well as his battles and encounters with Naruto. This was going to be interesting. But thankfully, Sasuke being the good friend that he was, had also filled her in about Naruto's and Sakura's personalities, so she knew what to say and do around them, although she was having trouble with Naruto, if her disdain for him was any indication.

An uneasy silence had settle around the group. Tsunade and Kakashi wondered how the two younger ninjas would handle this.

Sakura had actually been thinking a lot about Sasuke recently, but not in the way that she used to, always fawning over him and dreaming of being his wife. She had decided that she needed to toughen up more, to get over her former crush's betrayal. She wasn't going to give up on bringing him back to Konoha, though. The thing is, she just grew tired of the emotional trauma that came with the whole situation and decided that she was going to rise above it.

Taiga was surprised to see Sakura smile genuinely at her. "Well, welcome to the team, Taiga!" She said, holding no traces of pain. "I think we'll be able to get along very well." She then gave a currently hurt and confused Naruto a look that said 'I'll talk with you later and explain'.

Taiga was stunned. Sasuke said that Sakura was a hopeless fan girl when it came to him and that she was obssessed with him and probably took his departure extremely harshly. What had changed? She made a mental note to tell Sasuke about this when she wrote back to Akatsuki to inform them of her progress in her assigned task.

Naruto decided that if Sakura could suck it up and be strong, he could too. He faced Taiga and grinned at her. "So, teammate, you haven't answered my question. Do you like ramen?"

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**Hooray! In chapter 3, more will be revealed about Taiga and what she really is doing in Konoha. I suppose all of you can guess that she has some ulterior motive. I'm open to suggestions for any character pairings. Don't forget to review and check for more updates!**


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: I don't own anything from Naruto, but Taiga is my original character.**

**Also, this story doesn't strictly follow the events in the manga, though it contains certain elements of it. And no, I don't hate Ino, she was just the most suitable character for Taiga to disturb.**

**Thank you for last time's reviews, they were all appreciated! **

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"Sakura, what's up with you? Have you forgotten about Sasuke?" Naruto whispered to his teammate. The two were walking far behind Kakashi and Taiga as the team made their way to the ramen stall. It had been a long day for them so far; they met Taiga in the late morning and her spar with Kakashi took up the afternoon. It was now almost time for dinner.

"No, I haven't, Naruto," Sakura's voice was barely audible. "It's because I decided that it was time for me to move on. No, I'm definitely not going to forget about going after him or give up on bringing him back to us. I'm just not going to accept defeat and keep moping about. I think it'll be better for everyone, especially the both of us, if we can handle this in a mature way like real shinobi should. For all we know, something good may come out of this whole thing. You never know."

Naruto let Sakura's words sink in. He decided that what she said had some truth to it. However, he knew that it would take time before he could get accustomed to having Taiga around instead of Sasuke. The two of them were quite different.

"Fine," Naruto said. "I'll give her a chance, but I'm not guaranteeing anything. I just hope she doesn't do anything to get on my nerves..."

Sakura smiled at her close friend. "Thank you for understanding, Naruto."

Meanwhile, Kakashi and Taiga were discussing the contents of the Icha Icha book that was currently in the girl's hands.

"So the perv Jiraya gets all this from his peeking?" Taiga sounded unimpressed as she flipped through the orange book, skimming through the story.

Kakashi look offended. "It's the best book ever! Pure genius if you ask me."

"I wasn't asking."

Before the silver-haired man could retort, Taiga continued. "I mean, it's not that great. Okay sure he has a really active imagination if he comes up with all of this only by spying on girls, but it draws me to the conclusion that he didn't get any of this by experiencing it for himself first-hand. I kind of pity him, don't you? He seems rather deprived."

Kakashi decided that he needed to consider that thought. However, he was thankful that he was saved from giving Taiga a response when Naruto and Sakura caught up with them.

"There it is!" Naruto screamed as he dash towards the ramen stall. "Ichiraku Ramen!"

"Naruto has a bit of an obssession with ramen," Sakura explained to Taiga.

Taiga found out later that 'a bit' was an understatement with 34 bowls of ramen gone and Naruto still going strong. Kakashi had already left long ago after eating his fill. Now, Naruto was sitting in the middle of Sakura and Taiga who were watching him devour his food, the later with her eyes wide.

"Hey! Forehead-girl!"

The new team seven turned around simulaneously to see Ino, Shikamaru and Chouji join them. Sakura scrowled at Ino for the nickname.

"Who's this?" Shikamaru asked, indicating to Taiga.

"I'm Taiga," she introduced herself. Her eyes took in the images of the Ino-Shika-Cho trio. According to what Sasuke had told her before, the fatass was Chouji, pineapple head Shikamaru and Ino was the vain girl. She put on a smile and decided to humour them a little. "And you three are?"

Ino immediately took the lead. "I'm Yamanaka Ino, and that's Nara Shikamaru and Akimichi Chouji. The three of us are a team." She seized Taiga up and was not exactly happy with what she saw. The girl seemed to look a whole lot like her. In fact, she was sure that Taiga was copying her style.

"You know," Ino said, her tone rather acidic, "I'm slightly flattered, but I think you should have a little originality."

"What?"

"I mean that you have obviously copied my style."

If the rest of the ninja there weren't scared of what the two girls might do, they would have found the situation funny. Taiga and Ino did look slightly similar. Their long, blonde hair was tied up in a high ponytail with part of their fringe coming down their face. The only thing was that Ino's hair was a lighter shade of blonde while Taiga's was slightly darker.

Taiga narrowed her eyes. She surprised everyone by keeping silent and dragging a dumbfounded Naruto out of his seat, leaving his ramen half-eaten. Without warning, the ramen bowl exploded, the noodles and soup suspiciously missing everyone except for Ino. There was a stunned silence until Ino let out a frustrated grunt and shook with fury.

"Troublesome..." Shikamaru muttered.

Sakura and Chouji watched, admiring Taiga for her boldness.

"My ramen!" Naruto exclaimed, more upset over his unfinished meal.

"Don't worry, dickless, I'll buy you a new bowl if it consoles you."

"...Sai," Muttered Naruto as the ANBU Root agent walked up to the group of teenagers.

"Sai!" Ino wailed, going from agressive to helpless in a split second as she launched herself at Sai. "Look what that girl did to me!"

Taiga raised an eyebrow, as if daring the boy to jump to Ino's defense. She knew he was Sai, from ANBU Root. "I'm Taiga," she said casually, extending a hand for him to shake.

Hesitating a little bit, Sai completed the handshake. "I'm Sai," he said before giving his customary smile, making no move that indicated any intention of harming Taiga, who shot Ino a triumphant look.

Ino growled and stomped off as Sakura grinned. "Thanks, Taiga," she said. "I think you may have gotten Ino off my back for good. Well, the problem is that she'll be onto yours now."

Taiga waved it away like it was no big deal. Shikamaru and Chouji tried not to smile. This was turning out to be an amusing night for them. Naruto ordered another bowl of ramen, insisting that Sai was paying.

"Well, Shikamaru and I better be going off now," Chouji said. "We don't want Ino doing anything too drastic or - "

"Troublesome." Shikamaru finished for him. The two best friends then headed towards the direction Ino had run off in.

Sai looked questioningly at Taiga. "You did that to Ino?"

"Not directly," Taiga reasoned.

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_Later on in the middle of the night_

Taiga stared out of the window at her new apartment offered to her for free by the Hokage. It was nearly midnight, and the sky was a beautiful shade of dark blue with numerous stars shining down over Konoha. It was a relatively cloudless night, just the way she liked it.

Suddenly, a bird appeared outside the window, which Taiga quickly opened, allowing it to fly inside. Upon closer inspection, one could tell the bird was made of clay.

"Just on time, in fact..." Taiga mused to herself. She formed a simple handseal. "Kai!"

The clay bird exploded, though the sound wasn't loud enough to alert anyone who might be awake next door. As the smoke from the explosion cleared up, Taiga could see a piece of origami paper lying exactly where the bird used to be. She picked it up and read the letter addressed to her.

_Hey, Taiga-chan!_

_So how was your first day, un? We're all waiting back here for your report to come in. Keep on filling us in on everything that goes on around there. We'll be sending you our messages using my clay art and Konan's paper from now on since it doesn't burn up when my clay explodes, un. When you write to us, give your letters to Danzou of ANBU's Root division, he's on our side and has a way to send messages to us without arousing suspicion. He has this boy called Sai working under him that can use his ninjutsu to send out letters, un._

_Sasuke and Itachi want me to remind you to keep your cool and not blow anyone up. Zetsu will be coming by from time to time for spying purposes. Konan says that you can and must destroy this paper with your explosions after you wet it. Also, Hidan wants me to tell you to stay tough and "don't take shit from anyone". We miss you, un._

_Deidara_

Taiga smiled as she read through her brother's letter. It was good to hear from him and her other friends. She went to the toilet to wet the origami paper before blowing it up, leaving no traces or eivdence of her communication with Akatsuki or Sasuke. When Taiga was in her room again, she took out some paper and a pen.

_Hi Deidara and everyone else,_

_My first day was cool. Bumped into team Kakashi and they brought me to Konoha to meet Tsunade. The retards fell for the story so easily it was almost scary. I'm an official Konoha shinobi now, but I'm a genin (don't any of you dare to laugh at me, I was seriously insulted). They made me a replacement for Sasuke. Surprisingly, Sakura was really accepting, and Naruto's alright too, he'll start to trust me soon enough. I met Ino, Shikamaru, Chouji and Sai already. Speaking of Sai, I'll hand this letter to him directly, it'll be easier than looking for Danzou all the time._

_Hidan will be pleased to know that I blew up a half-eaten bowl of ramen in Ino's face for trying to insult me. And no Sasuke, Itachi, I haven't blown anyone up yet, though I was tempted to blow Tsunade up for placing me as a lowly genin and Naruto for laughing about it. Also, I've already destroyed the previous letter and will keep an eye out for Zetsu. _

_I haven't found out much yet since it's still my first day here. But I'll definitely have more and more things to leak when the dimwits here start trusting me in due time._

_Love, Taiga_

Taiga re-read her letter again to check if she'd missed anything out. The mission she was sent on by Akatsuki and Sasuke was a long-term one and she wasn't even sure when it would end. After all, her mission would only finish at the same time as Konoha would, as well as Naruto's jinchuriki career.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: When I meant certain manga elements, I meant a really small percentage(: Also, thank you for all the reviews and favourites, they mean a lot to me! **

**I don't anything from Naruto, but Taiga's an original character.**

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Taiga crashed to the ground with Naruto sprawled directly on top of her. They both gave a simultaneous yelp and Naruto quickly jumped onto his feet while Taiga rolled over into a crouching position, breathing heavily.

"Damn it," Taiga panted as the hyperactive teen in front of her gave a cocky smirk, not at all out of breath, both of them ignoring the previous awkward position.

It was a nice, bright morning at one of Konoha's many training fields, and exactly a week since Taiga had met Naruto, Kakashi and Sakura. She was currently practising her taijutsu with her teammate, Naruto. Or more like she was being thrown around while Naruto made it seem like no big deal.

"Your stamina and taijutsu skills are really lousy, you know," Naruto said as he offered a hand to Taiga.

Taiga accepted the gesture and allowed Naruto to pull her up. "Yeah, they must be if you can beat me this easily..."

"Please, I'm awesome and you know it!"

Taiga had no retort to that statement, because it was in fact true. Naruto was pretty decent when it came to taijutsu, not to mention his seemingly never-ending stamina that allowed him to keep going strong. Taiga, on the other hand, was downright lousy in terms of her physical stamina and taijutsu skills. She had never seen the need to practice anything else but her ninjutsu, seeing as it was so powerful anyway.

Kakashi and Sakura walked up to the pair of blondes. The jonin was actually quite disappointed in Taiga. He'd expected her to be some sort of genius after she was able to pass the bell test so quickly, but that image was quickly shattered once he'd seen her have a taijutsu spar with Naruto the day after. He was trying to reason with himself that Taiga being able to obtain the bell from him in record time was just a fluke, for the sake of his pride.

"Taiga, we're going to make you work on your stamina," Kakashi said, earning an immediate groan from her. "You'll be training on this with Naruto every single day in the early morning. You are to keep up with him as you both do laps around Konoha."

"Urgh, the whole 'laps around Konoha' thing makes you sound like Gai..." Taiga winced. She still hadn't caught her breath yet.

_Flashback_

_Team Seven had just arrived at their training field in the morning ready to train when something that looked remotely like a green whirlwind came rushing straight for Kakashi and collided into him._

_When all the smoke from the collison had cleared up, an irritable Kakashi was found on the ground, unable to move because his legs were tangled with another man's. That man was dressed in green spandex and had a hairdo that sent shivers up Taiga's spine. _

_"I'm sorry, Kakashi, my eternal rival! I miscalculated my dynamic entry!" The man sobbed as Kakashi untangled himself and directed a one-eyed death glare at him. _

_"Gai sensei!" Another voice called out as three other shinobi who were a year older than Taiga ran up to them. _

_Taiga racked her brain to remember what other information Sasuke had told her. The freak who landed on Kakashi was Gai, the Gai look-a-like was Lee, the girl with the two buns on her head was Tenten and the stoic-looking guy was Neji. _

_Gai jumped up. "I'm okay, Lee!" He said, giving his signature 'nice guy' pose to his student before directing his attention back on Kakashi. "Now, what shall we do? One thousand push-ups, or my personal favourite, five hundred laps around Konoha on our hands?"_

_End of flashback_

Taiga remembered that incident really well, especially the mentally scarring image of Gai and Kakashi together on the ground. Lee was very nice and polite to her, though Taiga could tell he had a thing for Sakura. Tenten didn't leave much of an impression on her, but she seemed nice enough. Gai, needless to say, just freaked her out, but seemed harmless otherwise. It was Neji that she felt she needed to be careful around. Although she already knew from Sasuke that Neji wasn't one of the warmest people you'd meet, he seemed to carry a certain dislike for her, almost as if he expected her to do something bad. Taiga reasoned later that Neji was one of the smarter ones around Konoha, and she would need to put in extra effort to gain his trust. She just hoped that there were more trusting idiots than calculative people in this village.

It was Kakashi that winced this time. "Don't insult me like that..." He muttered and hung his head low.

"Well, let's begin now!" Naruto said enthusiastically. After all, this was probably nothing to him and it was a perfect chance at watching Taiga suffer as she'd hurled her fair share of insults at him during the past week or so.

Taiga resisted the urge to remind Kakashi of Gai's last dynamic entry as Naruto dragged her away.

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Naruto glanced to his left as he ran along the border of Konoha to check on how Taiga was doing. He wasn't surprised to see her panting and breathing heavily. They had been running for about half and hour, which was a considered a very short time for ninjas.

"How did you travel all the way from Iwa to Konoha if your stamina is this lousy?" Naruto asked, fully aware that Taiga probably would be too out of breath to even say anything.

Taiga just glared at Naruto, and showed him the finger.

"Now, what did you just do?" Naruto's eyes gleamed mischievously as he began to speed up, just to spite Taiga for her rudeness.

Taiga's eyes widened as she realised Naruto was getting faster. She rapidly shook her head. "I-i-it.... wa-was a h-h-handseal..." She choked out feebly.

Naruto chuckled and slowed down his pace again so Taiga could keep up. He liked Taiga more than he did a week ago when he first met her. She was quite amusing and vulnerable at times, mainly when she was in pain, but she could also be extremely intimidating and cold. He accepted her as a teammate, but probably not as a friend just of yet. Sometimes, things with her seemed a little bit off, and Naruto felt as if he couldn't fully trust her, but then he'd keep telling himself not to judge her for being Deidara's sister or how she behaved because of her rough childhood. He could safely say he knew what it felt like to be judged for something he had no control over.

A tug on his sleeve pulled him out of his thoughts. Turning to his left, he realised Taiga had already stopped using her legs and was hopelessly clinging onto his sleeve while he dragged her along. He took that as the cue to stop and Taiga immediately collapsed.

"It's not good to lie down immediately after you run, you know..." Naruto said, pulling Taiga up to her feet where she swayed dangerously, clutching a nearby tree for support.

Naruto expected some sort of retort, or at least a glare, but what he didn't expect was for Taiga to leap right at him out of nowhere with a sudden burst of energy. He shut his eyes, placed his arms over his head and braced himself for the impact. Taiga was scary when she was annoyed. However, the blow never came. Instead, there was the sound of a couple of explosions, muffled cries and two dull thuds on the ground.

As Naruto opened his eyes and lowered his arms slowly, the first thing he saw was Taiga right in front of him, although her back was turned, facing something that he couldn't quite see as his vision was obscured by her thick, blonde ponytail in his face.

"You okay?" Taiga turned to the side, allow Naruto full view of two bodies lying on the ground in front of them. By the looks of it, they were dead. Various parts of their bodies had been blown off, and blood was splattered all around them.

"Don't look so shocked," Taiga said with a casual wave of her hand before collapsing on the ground again from fatigue. She showed him a shuriken that she held in her hand. "Those guys were aiming right for you, so I had to do something, right?"

Naruto took the shuriken in his hand and inspected it. Surely enough, this looked like it was from the unknown ninja as it was custom made, so it was highly unlikely that it belonged to Taiga. "What did you do to them?"

"I... blew them up," Came the shaky response. Naruto took that as a sign of Taiga being unwilling to kill them. "They were drenched in water and sweat from the journey through the dense forest surrounding this area."

Naruto stared at the Taiga. She was still panting on the ground. "Thank you."

Taiga's head snapped up. "Huh?"

"I said thanks." Naruto grinned somewhat awkwardly. "You know... For saving me."

A smirked formed on Taiga's lips. She thought that she should be given an acting award, but instead just said, "Does that mean we stop training for today?"

That statement earned a real grin from Naruto this time. "Fine, but just this once. However, you're gonna help me drag these corpses to the Hokage tower for investigation."

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Later that night at approximately two o'clock in the morning, Taiga was still wide awake as she finished up her daily report to send to Akatsuki and Sasuke. She re-read the letter once more before heading out to meet Sai.

_Hi everyone,_

_Things have been going well so far. The plan today went smoothly, I'm now training privately on stamina with Naruto every morning by running laps around Konoha. Naruto doesn't suspect a thing and just thinks that I saved his ass out there. Konoha hasn't been able to identify those two that Sasori sent, let alone figure out which village they're supposedly from. I suppose you guys had Kakuzu do some work on them with his stitches, huh? But anyway, I think that Naruto's beginning to trust me more now. He almost found out about the true extent of my jutsu, though, so I had to come up with a lie about how they were drenched in water and sweat from the forest to avoid arousing his suspicion. Sakura has been gullible as always, and Kakashi is barely around anyway. I still haven't bumped into Neji since I first met him like I said already. Other than that, nothing else worth noting happened today._

_T._

Deciding the report was good enough, Taiga slipped out of her apartment discreetly. She travelled swiftly and silently, well hidden by the shadows along the streets of Konoha. She was heading to her daily meeting point with Sai. As she neared the designated area, she already sensed Sai's presence, though his form was completely hidden by the surrounding darkness.

Taiga didn't need to say anything as she arrived as Sai had sensed her presence too. The two shinobi never uttered a single word or made the slightest sound as they worked quietly. Sai took the report from Taiga and using his own special jutsu, re-wrote it, changed its form into a paper bird and sent it on its way. Taiga took back the letter; she would destroy it once she got back to her apartment. After exchanging a brief nod, Sai and Taiga went on their separate ways, leaving no traces of them meeting up.

If Taiga had to describe her relationship with Sai, she would say that he was probably the closest thing she had to a friend right now in Konoha. He was one of the two Konoha ninjas that knew where she really was from and what her purpose was. Sai was always friendly to her and found ways to help her out. He always met up every night with Taiga, faithfully keeping her secret and helping her with her job, and she was thankful for that. He seemed trustworthy, too, and Taiga felt that her secret was safe with him.

Before she knew it, Taiga was already back at her apartment. She blew up her report, leaving nothing of it but fine ashes and got ready to sleep.

She groaned as she thought of what Naruto would have in store for her stamina training the next day.

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**Thank you for reading! Don't forget to review. I love reviews(:**


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